Crypto Weekly Roundup: Citadel Changes Stance, Paying Taxes With Crypto, Russia Sanctions, And More

The most significant event right now, the Russia-Ukraine conflict has been affecting every single market. Cryptocurrencies are no exception. Russians are trying to escape the burden of sanctions with crypto, while the Ukrainian military receives global support through enormous crypto donations. Let’s find out more. 

Bitcoin

The crypto market had a sharp upward graph, with Bitcoin hitting $40,000 as a result of the Russian-Ukraine conflict. 

JP Morgan pointed out that the outlook for crypto and stablecoins was very positive given that Russian citizens were increasingly adopting crypto as the ruble plummeted.

Billionaire hedge fund manager and one of Bitcoin’s harshest and most vocal critics, Ken Griffin, has had a change of heart about the crypto space and Bitcoin. 

Amidst crippling economic conditions, Russian oligarchs could be turning to Bitcoin to evade sanctions.  

Ethereum

Ukraine’s tweet announcing that an airdrop is inbound has resulted in a wave of micro-donations on the Ethereum blockchain, ranging from $0.0001 ETH to $0.01 ETH. 

DeFi

The Algorand Foundation has announced a partnership and collaboration with Defi platform Defactor, which will allow the platform to develop a suite of DeFi products on Algorand.

Andre Cronje has dismissed reports of a bug in the Solidly protocol that could potentially lead to loss of user funds from the platform. 

Altcoins

Fantom’s daily transaction volume has surpassed that of Ethereum, despite the latter being a much higher ranked crypto as per market cap. 

Technology

MetaMask and Infura came under fire from Crypto Twitter as it accidentally blocked Venezuelan users from accessing its service while attempting to comply with new sanctions announced by the United States of America. 

The German-founded organization Northern Data AG has formed a partnership with the state of Oklahoma in a collaborative effort to advance its vision.

Business

Cube Entertainment has partnered up with The Sandbox to develop tokenized assets for the game featuring K-Pop and other elements of Korean culture. 

Andreesen Horowitz invests $70 million in the decentralized Ethereum staking platform, Lido Finance, in a bid to move towards a more democratized staking model. 

The Swiss city of Lugano signed a partnership with Tether to establish a blockchain center, which will allow citizens and businesses to pay taxes in crypto. 

Shareholders at ConsenSys have accused the board members of severe irregularities and have filed a request for a multi-billion dollar audit to investigate “Project North Star.”  

BitConnect founder Satish Kumbhani disappeared and went off the radar after being charged criminally in the United States by the SEC with a $2.4 billion Ponzi scheme.

The FTX Foundation has launched a $100 million Future Fund to support scalable, philanthropic projects in different fields. 

Regulations

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong has pointed out the transparent nature of digital ledgers and raised the question of whether Russian oligarchs would risk exposing their affairs by using crypto to avoid sanctions. 

The former first lady and presidential candidate Hilary Clinton spoke with Rachel Maddow on MSNBC about Russia’s use of cryptocurrency to evade Russian sanctions.

The UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) wrote to cryptocurrency exchanges based in the UK, reminding them of their responsibilities and pressuring them to comply with the enforcement of sanctions. 

Amidst sanctions imposed by the US, UK, and the EU, banning crypto operations and wallets for Russian civilians raises questions of ethical implications.

The Biden administration issued a special request to crypto exchanges to cooperate and ensure that Russia does not evade any economic sanctions through crypto channels.  

NFT

Solana-based, decentralized music and media platform Snowcrash has partnered up with Sony and Universal to allow the labels’ artists to release music on the Snowcrash platform as NFTs.  

After adding Bitcoin and Ethereum to its balance sheet, KPMG Canada has bought its first NFT from the World of Women (WoW) collection. 

Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.